sandridge weekly news€¦ · 12/06/2020 · sandridge weekly news friday 12th june 2020 . this...
TRANSCRIPT
‘Head’lines (Miss Lisa Roberts, Headteacher)
Following the Secretary of State’s announcement earlier this week regarding primary aged children returning to school, I am sure you are as disappointed as we are that children in Years 2 – 5 will not be
returning in quite the way that the Government had originally intended. Now that we know this, we have begun to make plans for the remainder of this term.
As I have said before, we are reviewing our home learning provision regularly and have now made
some changes that will begin from the start of next week:
Work that is sent home has been set with children’s prior learning in mind. Teachers are planning tasks that build on these skills in order to help children progress within those subject areas. Where the ‘Chilli
Challenge’ is appropriate, spice levels are used to deepen understanding and children are being encouraged to apply their skills to a range of contexts.
Each year group has been learning about new topics in a ‘creative curriculum’ format. These units are planned by teachers to ensure children are not repeating prior learning and are being encouraged to
explore new areas. New knowledge is being shared through attaching slides, reading or signposting to videos and websites. The response to this approach has been overwhelmingly positive and the work
being shared with us has demonstrated how well the children have been responding.
We will continue this approach for the remaining five weeks but, as a step on from this, from next week, we will be inviting you to send in your child’s work to new class email accounts. At the end of each
week, teachers will review each child’s work and provide a feedback document in the form of positive comments and next steps (where appropriate) which will be sent back to you via email.
You can scan work, attach documents and/or send in photos and videos. Use whichever is the most appropriate for the type of work you are sending. If you do not have the means to do any of these we
are happy for you to drop off the actual work to the office. Feel free to ‘drip feed’ the work in throughout the week but it must be sent by 3:30p.m on a Friday. This enables teachers to look at work over the weekend and type up the feedback documents in order to get these out to you the following Monday. Key worker pupils in school will have their work looked at by their
class teachers throughout the week and be provided with a feedback sheet in the same format. Please note; teachers will continue to send badges and stickers out to you via Marvellous Me but these
will be for more of the ‘wow’ pieces of work rather than for each piece. We would ask that you do not send in the last 12 weeks’ worth of work to teachers though – this would be an unmanageable task. If you wish to send in a little from this week, that is fine but do focus on sending work from next week
onwards. Thank you.
Teachers won’t necessarily respond to each and every email where work is attached – they will not have the time to do this (please remember, they are still teaching all day). However, if you have a question specific to a home learning task or if there is a problem accessing a document, please use the class
email and the teacher will respond to you directly. We will keep our home learning email account running so do keep sending in any photos to this account
if you wish them to go on the website.
The new class email accounts are as follows: [email protected]
[email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected]
continued on next page… For all other queries/questions, please contact the office email account in the usual way. We do hope September brings a level of normality but even that seems uncertain at the moment. We have very recently purchased Google Classroom and teachers are currently accessing a range of
SANDRIDGE WEEKLY NEWS Friday 12th June 2020
This week’s learning…in school and at home
“Sam’s Sandwiches” in Reception
At school, Mrs Hardie read Reception children the story of “Sam’s Sandwiches”. Then they went
outside, buttered a piece of bread and the children had to hunt for slugs, woodlice and spiders to
put in their bug sandwiches! Don’t worry… they didn’t eat them though, they let them crawl away!
Children also did this at home – although, in this case, we can’t say whether they ate their
sandwiches or not!
Year 2 and 3 Rock Garden
Year 2 and 3 key worker children have enjoyed
creating their own little rock garden this week, which has
taken up residence in the garden outside the Year 3
classroom. If children at home would like to add their handiwork
to the garden, then they can drop their painted rocks into
the bucket just inside the gate from next week
onwards. Please avoid drop off and pick up times –
thank you!
‘Head’lines (Miss Lisa Roberts, Headteacher) continued
For all other queries/questions, please contact the office email account in the usual way.
We do hope September brings a level of normality but even that seems uncertain at the moment. We have very recently purchased Google Classroom and teachers are currently accessing a range of training modules via webinars. It will take time to complete the training in this way, but the summer
break does give teachers time to become confident in using this platform should we need to continue providing home learning in September. And if, as we hope, the children are back in school then, we will
be able to use the platform to enhance classroom practice.
I am aware there is a lot of information here so I hope it all makes sense. If you have any questions, please do contact me via the school office.
In the meantime, have a good weekend and enjoy the next mini heatwave!
This week’s learning…in school and at home
Save the Hedgehog with Year 4!
Year 4 are studying climate change and this week they were asked to focus their learning on one aspect of this important subject. Lots of children chose urbanisation which led them to
discover the loss of habitat for our wildlife. Some of the children felt especially strongly about the plight of the poor hedgehog, which is now an endangered species. Mrs Ivory told them
about a hedgehog charity in London Colney (http://londoncolneyhedgehogrescue.weebly.com/) and Molly, Lucia, Olivia and Bella (and Oliver at home) got straight on to creating posters to
raise money for them!
Year 6
This week Year 6 have continued with their Tudor Topic. At school, they have tea-stained paper to create old Tudor maps; made a crown for a monarch; made projects about Queen
Elizabeth I; explored Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre by taking a virtual tour; and kept our maths skills up to speed when looking at volume.
There have been some unexpected benefits to coming in as a child of a key worker.
Courtney in Year 1 says, “I am having fun making friends with Emily and Aaron. When the virus is over we
can still play on the field together”.
We have been very proud of the way our key worker children have adapted to being at school during this
unusual time.
Home Learning
We love seeing all your home learning photographs – keep them coming! They are being uploaded onto the website regularly, so do check the “Home Learning” tab, in the “Parent”
section of our website (https://www.sandridge.herts.sch.uk/parents/home-learning/).
In order to celebrate the hard work from children (and parents!) we are creating “Lockdown Learning” displays around the school. Staff and children who are here can look at them now,
and children at home will be able to see their work displayed proudly on the school walls when we are all back together again, sometime in the next academic year.
A big thank you to Mr Robbins for his creativity – Year 6, 4 and 3 to follow next week!
REPS Certificates (Respect, Equality, Perseverance, Self-belief)
have been awarded to:
Harrison – Nursery Orla – Reception
Courtney – Year 1 Roxy – Reception
Jasmine – Year 3 Molly – Year 4
Tom – Year 6 Freya - Year 6